JOHANNESBURG: South Africans voiced anger Thursday at US President Donald Trump’s persistent false claim of a genocide against white farmers that were repeated in talks with President Cyril Ramaphosa.
The talks between the two presidents Wednesday were aimed at repairing relations that have nosedived since Trump took office in January, since threatening high trade tariffs and expelling the South African ambassador.
“I am not happy,“ university student Nicole Mbhele told AFP. “He made it seem like we want to kill white people or white farmers for our land or wanting it back,“ she said.
A video aired during the meeting showed the leader of a fringe, radical opposition party chanting a song from the anti-apartheid struggle about “killing” white farmers.
Trump also repeated baseless allegations that South Africa was expropriating land from the minority white Afrikaners, descendants of Dutch settlers who own more than three-quarters of commercial farmland.
“Donald Trump does not have facts about what is happening in South Africa,“ said 25-year-old saleswoman Naledi Morwalle. He was making “false accusations about our country,“ she said.
South Africans followed the meeting live on television and many were proud of the performance of the South African delegation, reinforced by four cabinet ministers and two top golfers.
While some said Ramaphosa could have been more adamant in rejecting Trump’s baseless claims of a “white genocide”, others noted his calm pushback that the black South Africans suffer most from the high crime rate.
“I think our country did well and actually put the facts out there,“ said activist Ulrich Steenkamp. “Whether the world responds is up to them,“ he added.
The video played during the meeting, which also showed rows of white crosses in what Trump falsely said were graves of murdered white farmers, clearly rattled Ramaphosa, said analyst Thelela Ngcetane-Vika, of the Wits School of Governance.
“In the first half of the session President Ramaphosa was very well prepared, poised as a statesman, diplomatic... but when that video played you could literally see his voice language change, he became uneasy,“ she told AFP.
Ramaphosa should have provided data to disprove Trump’s disinformation, she said.
An Afrikaans father, Authur Williams, told AFP the success of the talks would only be seen in any trade deals reached between the two major trading partners.
“I sincerely hope that economically we will come to an agreement where it’s mutually beneficial and there are economic benefits for both parties,“ he said.
